The Panthers may be a team of boxers instead of a volleyball team.

Some of the matches in the young season have been like good boxing matches.

The Panthers can take a loss and then come back and win. In the two tournaments – the EIU Pepsi Challenge and Southern Methodist University Tournament – Eastern has competed in the past two weekends. Six of the matches have went to four games or more, and the Panthers are (3-1) in those situations.

In the first game of the EIU Pepsi Challenge against Memphis, the Panthers looked tired, losing the game (13-30), yet they were able to come back and take it to five games to win the match.

In the three matches they played at the tournament this past weekend, the Panthers played 12 games and won nine of them to take the EIU Pepsi Tournament Challenge.

In each match against Memphis, Loyola (Chicago) and Indiana State, they won the first two games and dropped the third each time – and then coming back to win the fourth game.

Eastern has been dominant.

They once again had impressive stats, but even in the categories they did not dominate, they still emerged victorious.

Senior setter Maren Crabtree was awarded the Most Valuable Player honor, and Alex Zwettler was named to the All-Tournament team for a second consecutive tournament.

Crabtree had 146 assists throughout Eastern’s tournament at Lantz Arena and Alex had 53 kills overall.

Zwettler notched a double-double in her young career. Sophomore libero Shaina Boylan had 27 digs for the weekend, leading all other players. Sophomore middle blocker Amy Sesol had five blocks in the match against Loyola alone.

These numbers and honors are showing the Panthers have shown a big improvement.

The team – of new and old players alike – is playing well together.

Eastern head coach Lori Bennett must be excited to see her team melding so well together. She also must be impressed with the prospect that this may possibly get better considering 10-of-13 teammates are underclassmen. This largely underclassmen team may become a juggernaut upperclassmen team in a few seasons.

But all these numbers are meaningless without the will to win behind them, which the Panthers proved they had.

The ability to shake off a loss and come back to compete and win again has been proven so far.

That makes a statement that cannot be overlooked.

That makes the Panthers a team that cannot be overlooked.

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